Fenway Park (46 page)

F
ollowing the 1989 shortfall, there was little reason to believe that Boston would be playing in October of 1990. But when Bill Buckner came back as a spring-training long shot, it seemed a cosmic sign of faith renewed. Buckner received a warm and redemptive Opening Day ovation from the forgiving, if not quite forgetting, Boston fans. Then he legged out an inside-the-park homer against the Angels on his first day in the lineup.

So it went for the Sox, who beat the Twins, 1-0, in a July game where they hit into two triple plays in five innings after conceding only two in the previous 25 years. Buoyed by magnificent pitching from Roger Clemens and Mike Boddicker, Boston built a lead of more than a half-dozen games by Labor Day. But after Clemens went down with a sore shoulder, the club dropped 10 of 12 and slipped behind the Blue Jays. The season came down to the final day at Fenway, with Boddicker on the mound; Boston needed a victory over the White Sox to avoid a playoff at Toronto, where Clemens already had been dispatched, just in case.

With the hosts ahead, 3-1, in the ninth and Chicago down to its last strike, champagne was at the ready. But Sammy Sosa singled and Red Sox closer Jeff Reardon plunked Scott Fletcher. Then up stepped future manager Ozzie Guillén to rip a line drive toward the right-field corner. Had it bounced past a diving Tom Brunansky, the game at least would have been tied. “No time to think about what I should do,” said Brunansky, who raced toward the noman’s-land by Pesky’s Pole. “I just had to do it.”

What resulted was one of the greatest catches in Fenway history, with Brunansky snaring the ball just before sliding into the wall. “Timmy, I’ve got the ball, I’ve got the ball,” he shouted to Tim McClelland, the first-base umpire, one of the few people in the park who had a clear view. “I saw the play,” McClelland said. “He never dropped the ball.”

Thus did Boston claim the divisional title and earn a rematch with Oakland. “They called us misfits from the North Pole, castoffs,” said Wade Boggs. “We were etched in stone for seventh place. But this team has got heart and desire I’ve never seen before. A heart as big as the Pru.”

But up against A’s aces Dave Stewart and Bob Welch, the Boston bats were as useless as toothpicks, managing only two runs in the first two games at Fenway. “A beautiful game turned into a horrible evening, didn’t it?” mused manager Joe Morgan after the 9-1 opening loss, when Oakland bashed his bullpen for nine runs—seven in the ninth inning—after Clemens had blanked the visitors for the first six innings.

Wade Boggs rejoiced after the Red Sox clinched the 1990 East Division title with a victory over the Chicago White Sox.

The next evening was less horrid, but the 4-1 defeat sent the Sox to the Bay Area in a formidable pickle. “You don’t have to tell ’em too much now,” Morgan said. “They can read that easy enough.” Another 4-1 stumble in Game 3 put Boston on the verge of an early winter and after Clemens was ejected in the second inning of Game 4 for yapping at plate umpire Terry Cooney, his teammates went down by a 3-1 count, swept again and bitterly criticizing their manager.

“Those things don’t bother me,” Morgan said. “They don’t amount to a row of beans. I’ll tell you this—if a guy is going to manage in Boston, that guy better have some thick skin on his body. We’ve won two out of three years, so we must be doing something right.”

Boston would not play another playoff game for five seasons. The front office signed Clemens to a five-year contract worth more than $20 million. But before the 1991 season, there were multiple departures (Boddicker, Dwight Evans, Oil Can Boyd, Marty Barrett) and a few notable arrivals (Jack Clark, Danny Darwin, Matt Young). While Clark, acquired from the Padres, made a concussive entrance on Opening Day, clouting a grand slam in a 6-2 decision over Toronto, his new comrades were all but buried by midsummer, falling nine games behind after the Twins swept them by a 33-6 aggregate.

The Sox made a heroic late run, winning 12 of 14 in August and 17 of 21 in September, and found themselves only a half-game out of the lead on September 21 in the wake of hammering the Yankees, 12-1, at Fenway. “It’s not over yet,” cautioned Clark. “We’re still in second place.” That proved to be the summit for the Sox, who dropped 11 of their final 14 games to tumble out of contention. They came home to Yawkey Way for a somber farewell weekend. “Have a good autumn, a good winter and we’ll have a better year next year,” Morgan promised the fans before the Sunday finale against the Brewers.

Two days later, Morgan was gone, replaced by Butch Hobson, the Pawtucket skipper and former Sox third baseman the front office feared it would lose without a promotion. Morgan shrugged off his dismissal. “I think they just wanted a change, that’s all,” said the man who’d been the only manager other than Bill Carrigan to direct the Sox to the postseason twice in three years. “If they thought I wasn’t doing the job, they had every right to fire me.”

Hobson, who’d been in Winter Haven with the instructional team, was startled to learn he’d been upgraded. “I can’t believe this is happening to me,” he said following his Fenway introduction. “This is the greatest feeling in the world.”